IF INTENSITY COULD BE MEASURED on a 1-to-10 scale, Coach Mike O’Dell might be an 11. No matter the challenge, whether producing top throwers or going toe-to-toe with his athletes in Go Fish, he is all in at all times.
Ditto for Jaslene Massey, the ’26 US U20 champ in the shot and disc, and a young lady of seemingly boundless energy. Looking for a house in the Mission Viejo area? Give her a shout. She’s a licensed realtor. Planning a trip to Eugene sometime in the next 5 years when ’26 Niguel HS (Aliso Viejo, California) grad Massey will be tossing for the University of Oregon? Hop into her DMs, and she’ll direct you to a cozy Airbnb.
Thinking ahead to a time you might need an extremely athletic lawyer who is also an expert in finance? Look no further, as Massey plans to spend her college years working toward an MBA and a law degree. Keep in mind that you may have to visit the local rink to find her, as Massey still unashamedly carries a torch for her original sporting crush — ice skating — and says that if given the chance to compete again she’d lace up her skates “immediately.”
These two forces of nature came together late in Massey’s sophomore season after O’Dell spotted her putting the shot 40 feet in a pair of Chuck Taylors. He realized they were kindred spirits when he sat her down and asked what she hoped to get out of throwing. “Everything,” she replied. “All the hardware. All the smoke.”
The hardware came quickly. After 6 weeks of working with O’Dell, Massey took 4th in the shot at the California State Meet. They celebrated by engaging in a battle of wills when O’Dell tried to get her to focus on the discus that summer. Massey says she was reluctant because “the disc is so light, it’s humiliating when it doesn’t go far.”
O’Dell insisted and more hardware ensued as Massey won the disc at the ’25 state meet and took 5th at the Nike Outdoor Nationals. Before long, it became her favorite event, but a rival remained. Years earlier, Massey had set aside ice skating and taken up volleyball, the sport at which her mother had excelled. Not surprisingly, she was quite good at it, and hoped to earn a DI scholarship. O’Dell pointed out that after one year of part time training she was already scholarship material as a thrower, with most of her potential still untapped.
His suggestion that she focus completely on throws training resulted in Battle of the Wills: The Rematch.
In the end, they compromised, Massey agreeing to limit her volleyball participation to the high school season rather than playing year-round with a club. That freed up a lot of time for lifting and throwing, and the extra training paid off when Massey blasted a California state record 196-4 (59.84) at this year’s championships while also winning the shot with an impressive 52-9 (16.07).
The smoke came in August as Massey, after upping her discus PR to 197-9 (60.27, No. 2 all-time HS) at USA U20s, arrived in Eugene with a chance to cement her status as one of the planet’s best at World Juniors.
Wildfires in the Willamette Valley caused an air quality alert which shut down “city pools, senior meal sites and outdoor camps” on a day when Massey, who suffers from asthma, would be competing in the shot qualification rounds, the discus final, and the shot final.
Undaunted, she took two attempts to secure a place in the shot final, then blasted 191-7 (58.41) to win the silver medal in a discus comp that was marred by the kind of inexplicable delays that make field event coaches wish they’d packed a spare bottle of Pepto-Bismol. Oregon throws guru Brian Blutreich estimates that the discus took twice as long as expected, not an ideal situation for Massey who was still tossing the platter while warmups began for the shot final.
Was she distracted? “Honestly,” she said afterwards, “I was so focused on the discus that I forgot I had to do the shot until it was finished and four people started rushing me to get over there.”
O’Dell calls that “going to the dark side,” and it’s a level of concentration that will serve Massey well as she joins a phenomenal group of throwers at Oregon in the fall which includes the NCAA 4th- and 7th-place finishers in the women’s disc.
Blutreich, who has coached NCAA greats Maggie Ewen, Jaida Ross, and Jorinde Van Klinken, is happy to welcome her aboard. Citing her athleticism, work ethic, and “excitement to improve,” he calls Massey “one of a kind.”
True that!
